Midi vs. Sound

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What is the difference between using Midi Vs. Sound? Is plugging in my keyboard into Cakewalk do the job? If Midi is not a choice is the next more expensive way using sound? What would be the ideal and cheapest solution? A Mixer into the sound card...?

Think of MIDI like the old time player pianos where you put a roll into it and the punches on the paper roll told the piano what notes to play. MIDI is a way for computers and musical instruments to communicate what is being played. When you plug your keyboard into your computer and enable it in Cakewalk, then Cakewalk records what notes you are playing on your keyboard (makes a piano roll file). Then when you tell Cakewalk to play this file back it communicates to your keyboard and says play these notes just like a person was sitting there playing these notes. The distinction here is you are recording and playing back your performance (which keys you pressed, how hard you struck the keys, how long you held the keys for sustain, etc...). No sound is actually being recorded, just the PERFORMANCE. When you play it back, the keyboard regenerates the sounds on the fly just as if you were actually sitting there performing the music again. Same thing applies to other MIDI enabled instruments (drums, guitar, saxaphone, etc...). This opens up all kinds of possibilities, you can redirect the recorded MIDI file to a completely different sound or instrument. Example... you record MIDI of you playing piano song, then you have Cakewalk play this MIDI back to your keyboard but you change the sound on your keyboard to guitar, it will play the same song, but now you will hear guitar instead of piano. Get it?

Once you understand this concept, then learn tracks, Cakewalk and other programs like this give you the ability to record multiple tracks and most keyboard have several voices (sounds) that can be played at the same time. So now you can record a MIDI track for a kick and snare sound, then record another track for a bass guitar sound, then record another track for a piano. Now that you have recorded all three tracks into a single Cakewalk song file, if you play it back to your keyboard, it will play all three simultaneously (drums, bass, & piano). This is done through the use of MIDI channels. On your keyboard you assign a different channel number for each of the instrument sounds (drums are usually channel 10 by default, make bass channel 12, piano channel 1).Once you understand this concept, then learn tracks, Cakewalk and other programs like this give you the ability to record multiple tracks and most keyboard have several voices (sounds) that can be played at the same time. So now you can record a MIDI track for a kick and snare sound, then record another track for a bass guitar sound, then record another track for a piano. Now that you have recorded all three tracks into a single Cakewalk song file, if you play it back to your keyboard, it will play all three simultaneously (drums, bass, & piano). This is done through the use of MIDI channels. On your keyboard you assign a different channel number for each of the instrument sounds (drums are usually channel 10 by default, make bass channel 12, piano channel 1).

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Related Questions:

Dont forget that the PCR50 is a Midi controller and as such has no "sound" of its own. You must have Midi compatible player or composer type software (like Reason, Cakewalk, Sonic, etc) to link up to the PCR50 to get any sound.

In Device Manager (I am assuming you are using Windows XP) you will find your MIDI devices under Sound, Video and Game controllers. It is possible that the MIDI port has not been enabled in BIOS, I have had some PCs where this had to be done first. If Fruity Loops doesn't give you any available MIDI port to use it does not sound as though the PC knows it's there or has installed the driver properly. Start in Device Manager - if there's no MIDI port there or it's not working for some reason you'll have to fix that first.

It would not be a "driver"... if anything you would need a music editing program. Some examples are like "Cakewalk", "Sonar" etc. This assumes you have a MIDI port on your PC. If not, a driver will come with the MIDI interface you need and buy.

The default MIDI setting of your PC may have been set for another MIDI device (for example, if Cakewalk Home Studio has been used with a MIDI compatible keyboard). Go to... Control Panel / Sounds and Audio Devices / Audio / MIDI music playback and change the setting back to your soundcard (and set as default if you prefer).

Signma Tel is notoriously bad for recording. It often doesn't work. But try changing your driver mode and then running the wave profiler. restart everything and make sure that your sound card is chosen under playback timing master and recordi timing master so that it is the chosen card. UNLESS- the keyboard has it's own sound card or interface built in, then its a different thing. You'll have to find out what kind of drivers THAT card uses and do same thing choosing that as card with correct drivers. Also check MIDI devices and make sure its in there. U might wanna email tech cuz this is a little more complicated than a regular set up

Certain early models of the Sound Blaster
cannot do both MIDI input and wave (audio) output at the same time. Thus,
if you've selected "Creative Labs" as a MIDI In device in Cakewalk’s
Options | MIDI Devices dialog, wave audio output won't work. Note that
MIDI output will work fine along with wave audio output: you can select
Creative Labs from the list of MIDI Out devices. The problem occurs only
when you've selected the Creative Labs MIDI In device.